On Monday a new group of Texas lawyers was sworn in at the New Lawyers Induction Ceremony.
Friends and family gathered at the Erwin Center along with representatives from the State Bar of Texas, the state’s law schools, the Texas Board of Law Examiners, and members of the Texas Supreme Court and the Court of Criminal Appeals to welcome hundreds of law schools grads to the Texas bar.
State Bar President Frank Stevenson addressed the crowd, noting that in Massachusetts, new attorneys sign a book after being sworn in, adding their names to a centuries-old list that includes prominent figures such as John Adams.
“Even if you today don’t sign one in the material sense, you sign one in every sense that matters. And that process will place you in a relationship with John Adams, yes, but also with Abraham Lincoln, Thurgood Marshall, the judges on this stage, your deans, professors, and every lawyer that came before you and every lawyer who will come after you,” Stevenson said.
This year there were two high scorers of the Texas Bar Exam—Michelle Justine Haws, of South Texas College of Law Houston, and Clinton J. Kuykendall, of SMU Dedman School of Law— and they both expressed thanks to their families, friends, and law schools.
“I don’t have any profound advice or earth-shattering nuggets of wisdom to share with you here to today, but the one thing I do have a lot of is gratitude,” Haws said. “Of course, like everyone else, I’m very grateful to have passed the bar exam and all the opportunities that are going to be available to me as a licensed attorney.
Kuykendall expressed his thanks and then congratulated the newest attorneys on not only passing their bar exams, but for their undergraduate degrees, law degrees, and other accomplishments earned throughout their education.
“Today we get to celebrate this accomplishment together,” he said.
Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan L. Hecht administered the New Lawyer’s Oath, making note of the new civility clause.
“I charge you to recall, in all of your practice, the words of the oath you take today.”
View more photos of the ceremony on the State Bar of Texas’ Flickr page.